Read Minecraft Woodsword Chronicles – Night of the Bats free for 7 days. £7.99/month after - less than a paperback.
Nick Eliopulos's Night of the Bats is a Minecraft adventure for 7 year olds about five friends with two very different invasions on their hands, one at school and one inside the game.
It's the second Woodsword Chronicles book, and it carries straight on from the first, so start with Into the Game if you can.
It opens with the morning register and a funny noise in the air vents. Then the vent bursts open and the classroom fills with bats! Ash crawls back through the chaos to rescue Baron Sweetcheeks the class hamster (who couldn't care less once he's had his cookie).
Po has a theory. Bats are one of the most common mobs in Minecraft. So what if these came OUT of the game?
Inside the game, Morgan thinks it's time to go exploring. They find a llama, an emerald and a whole village of honking villagers. Then the sun goes down and dozens of monsters come over the mountain. A creeper explodes, and Morgan finds out that getting hurt in here really does hurt.
It's very funny along the way. Po keeps changing his skin (a clown to win the villagers over, a Viking for the big battle). Jodi names her floating staircase Don't Stair into the Sun. And Morgan asks, very carefully, whether they should eat the pet sheep. The girls are horrified!
Nobody has to be a Minecraft expert, because the friends talk each other through it. But anyone who plays will love watching Morgan and Harper build an iron golem out of four blocks of iron and a pumpkin.
The best bit is how the two stories start to meet. The friends find out why the bats have moved into school, and it's a sad reason. Then Harper wonders whether the monsters might have the same kind of problem. Is fighting harder really the answer?
It's worth knowing that the school decides to call in an exterminator for the bats. Jodi is very upset, and so are the others. If your reader is soft-hearted about animals they'll feel that worry too. They'll also be right behind five kids who refuse to accept there's nothing they can do.
If your reader comes away wanting to save the planet, Judy Moody Saves the World is a funny one to try. Judy hears in Science that trees are being cut down and animals are disappearing, and decides she can fix it before breakfast. (Her little brother Stink draws bats, too.)
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